Dungeon Finder: Friend, Foe or Fail?

Recently, a player on the official forums brought forth a strong opinion regarding the use and abuse of the Dungeon Finder. I'll admit, I haven't been using the Dungeon Finder much lately to find groups as I've been solely doing Heroics with my guildmates or premade server groups. Apparently, though, many players are reporting cases of abuse of the system, ending up in groups which are ruled by seemingly tyrannical leaders / groups who call the shots in rude and unfair ways. That is, when they're actually playing. Players are also reporting groups where people will queue up as a majority or tank / healer role, then refuse to actually play the game. I'm sorry, but if you're going to sit there and go through the trouble of logging into the game and queueing up for a dungeon, why the hell wouldn't you play?

How should players deal with this? Is it our responsibility to have to deal with attempting to kick players (which won't always work), or are changes to the Dungeon Finder by Blizzard the answer? Do you think the problem is in the Dungeon Finder's lack of penalty for such players? Would a karma system actually work? Read on for a full look at the Dungeon Finder system and learn to identify potential problem situations in dungeons and how to realize when to get out at all costs!

Ultimately the Dungeon Finder has been one of the most wonderful tools added to the game. It allows leveling players the opportunity to actually find dungeon groups and actually experience that range of content, as well as rewarding them with many experience heavy quests and great rewards. Also, I've noticed that in the past the groups I've gotten into using the Dungeon Finder from 15-60 have been pretty enjoyable, and with the content being recently redesigned it's actually surprisingly fun to tromp through ScholomanceOLD for the hundredth time.

However, apparently something magical and horrible happens when the Dungeon Finder is used for max level content. I was extremely surprised to find that groups at 85 were extremely underskilled and horrible compared to the ones I was leveling in. I guess at level 85 everyone has their big boy trousers on and that suddenly entitles them to spew out whatever implied elitism, hate and ignorance they decide, all the while playing the game absolutely terribly. What makes it different? Are people just nicer on their alts? Are the newer players just nicer and not yet as jaded, cynical and angry as many seasoned players have become? I read a Reddit post, in which a user asked, "If this game is so much fun, why is everybody always so angry?" I laughed, but it's true.

The Dungeon Finder in particular has really opened the doors of dungeons for players in many positive ways. That said, of course there are some shortcomings. We can't always put up design road blocks with the worst player behavior in mind, because that type of behavior is not the norm and shouldn't impede features which provide useful functionality for everyone.

We will continue to look for ways to improve the system to prevent abuse and griefing though, and we do welcome your feedback. :)

I've been reading tons of reports of these "nightmare PUGs" now, on other Warcraft news sites and sites such as Reddit, where stories of these horrors of the Dungeon Finder are posted every single day and I'll admit, most of the situations players are finding themselves in are pretty terrible. The whole "PuGs are awful" mindset has become so hard-set into the world we live in, it's a wonder players actually make new friends and meet new people in the game in this day and age. I looked over quite a few of these reports and came up with a bit of a summary of "problem child" situations which can be easily identified and should be avoided at all costs:

Classic PUG Problem Children

Tank / Healer Tyranny: We're the tank and healer, and all of you DPS classes are worthless peons who mean nothing therefore you must do everything we say and this includes giving up loot rights or dealing with us verbally berating you every minute.

Queuing For Queue's Sake: LOL I QUEUED AS A TANK OR A HEALER BUT I DON'T ACTUALLY PLAN ON DOING MY ROLE AND I'M JUST GOING TO STAND HERE LIKE AN IDIOT AND HOPE SOMEONE ELSE CAN DO MY JOB FOR ME LOLOLOL

I'm In A BG/Questing/AFKing: Oh, my queue popped, but I'm AFK watching the longest movie ever so I can't waste my time by dropping my queue or actually leaving the group I joined instead of making you wait to kick me

That Guy: LOL U MAD? I know I'm bad, and I'm going to play bad! I'm not going to try, pay attention or listen to advice because I think it's hilarious to waste my own time and the time of others by playing awfully and trolling people the entire run. I'm too busy Skyping with some honeys, brah, so why don't you just do your job and get me my points / loot!

Because We Said So: Oh hey we're all friends / from a guild / whatever and we all queued together so that means we can kick you for doing things like asking about boss abilities, saying you haven't been here, telling us you have to go AFK real quick, or because we don't like the fact that you're a blood elf. Deal with it.

All I can stress to players is that if it's in your power, don't deal with it - try to kick the offending player(s) if possible, and if not - don't waste your time on trolls: leave the group. So what if you have to sit through another DPS queue - log off, do something else (maybe something you had planned for another time), and let your queue tick down, then hop back in and try again. This will typically go better than sitting there and try to "save" the run over then next hour or two (or more), forcing yourself to justify it because you sat in the queue for so long or because you need your Daily or whatever. Doing so really only encourages forced tolerance of such behavior, and caters to the troll(s) - you don't have to tolerate it, this is definitely still a video game and you are definitely still the master of your own destiny within.

So what can Blizzard do to handle these type of players and situations? Will we ever see a system which banishes problem players from dungeons based on their previous actions? Many players have proposed such ideas, in which players who cause problems in a Dungeon Finder group would be penalized from using the tool for a period of time, or forced to suffer longer queues. Are you running into these sort of bad situations more often than not? What do you think Blizzard should do about the people abusing the Dungeon Finder system?

Comments

Comment by Bakaleaf

on 2010-12-28T21:40:29-06:00

only problem ive ever had with the LFG system was people either not willing to give someone a chance or just wont give to the groups abilities. my first heroic (so far only cause im more of a pvper on my main and after that...no more) was a nice run. one-three wipes a boss in halls of origination, even netted a one shot on the earth marrowgar. so we get to shadow boss on top....30 wipes and 6 hours later i ask if we can just take out fire boss and end it...we cant seem to get him down so be done with him...next thing i know im booted because the healer wants the drop from the shadow boss badly enough to wipe to infinity on it

Comment by herpookybear

on 2010-12-28T22:08:34-06:00

i ran into a problem like this last night...tank and healer were from the same server, they had let everyone die then they wouldnt rez they just sat there as ppl left and entered and were just mocking every player who entered saying rez usssss bwahahahaha lalalalala...just wasting everyones time...i wonder how long it went on for >.>

Comment by Chetti

on 2010-12-28T22:09:45-06:00

My main got to 80 without setting foot in a level-appropriate dungeon, except maybe once or twice with a friend that was above level. I did run some friend's alts through some dungeons later, just so I could see them.. but this doesn't count. This was before dungeon finder.

I have been leveling several different alts, either healers or dps, and using the dungeon finder tool. I've had some awesome groups, and some terrible groups. Having never seen (and probably won't for a while) an 85 dungeon, I can't comment on those or heroics of any kind, but the people that are terrible for whatever reason in those probably also carry that attitude with them to their alts running lowbie dungeons. A prime example is this one tank that ran with the entire first 2 tiers of shadowfang (the ones on the stairs, the ones at the top in the hall before the door) and was headed further.. when I told him I (a resto shaman) had one healing spell to work with. I did my best, he died. I repeated, I have one spell. He says you've never seen a tank do that, I said yes I have, just not at 20. We made it through, he still ran with mobs, but with lots of effort there were no more deaths. I'd imagine this would be an effective thing to do at higher levels, but I'm just grateful the chances of me randoming into a group with him again are slim and none.

I spend a lot of time leveling with a friend, we've got a dps/healer combo, our queue times vary depending on which set/faction we happen to be playing on. We stay in bad groups as long as possible to not get the dungeon deserter buff. Prior to the shattering patch, wait times were horrible.. even with a healer. By the time we got into a group, we certain didn't want to leave it to wait another half hour before we can even try again, and then wait almost 40 mins again. Now, it hasn't been that bad lately, but the same concept applies. Us getting the deserter buff punishes us for leaving, rather than the person who was causing the issues (bad tank, unruly dps who wont cooperate, etc).

I wouldn't go so far as to say the majority of groups are bad, I'd say that most groups are good. Sometimes no one talks, we get in and get through. Other times I've had really good groups while soloing, where we've just kept re-queuing until someone has to leave. I can't give tips, but I appreciate when someone offers me advice. The bad groups, I do my best to deal with.. I'll drop if it gets unbearable.. I'll report if neccessary.

As to what can be done about it, if anything from Blizzard, its hard to say. A rating system maybe, or a dungeon specific complaint system. I don't think it'd be fair to restrict the level at which people with guilds vs people without guilds can start using the tool itself. I am in a guild, but its just a bank (and a good portion of my alts aren't even in the guild).. why should I have to wait 5-10 levels more to use dungeon finder since I try to always be polite to everyone. I do think that maybe there should be a guild button or something, for example if a guild wants to queue with 4 out of 5, and pick up that last person, somehow it could be marked as a guild random so that the player going in has prior knowledge (and may want to decline without penalty) that they are getting into a mostly pre-made group. With all of the new guild features, I'm surprised this isn't one of them - a special way for guilds to random. This isn't going to help the last person who randoms in if the guild happens to be rude, but it'd be a start. If there were a rating system, like in the trade/follow/etc list, only available during dungeons/randoms with a thumbs up or down would adjust a rating. Like now, its supposed to be a shorter deserter buff if you don't always leave randoms or whatever.. but maybe the pentaly for people with more thumbs downs could be a longer re-queue time.. 15 mins, 30 mins, 45 mins, hour.. etc. If the person effectively gets kicked, the can generally queue again since they'll get booted without penalty. If there was a penalty some may think twice about treating groups badly. 15-30 mins isn't all that bad, but 45-an hour or more, that'd be bad after a while.

Comment by uridara

on 2010-12-28T22:18:22-06:00

As healer I've been doing Random dungeons to build up my skills, but for some reason no matter what I do,I end up either getting a tank from hell, or a group that follows a tank from hell.

The best I've had of this was when I was grouped with a friend in my first Heroic, and we w're doing really well, but the tank had to leave due to falling asleep, the next tank comes in and firstly demands group leadership, then when we wiped on a boss he kicks me for being a bad healer.. My friend who was also talking to me on Vent was giving me a blow by blow run down of the fight after I left said that the tank was slagging me off after the kick and then with the new healer they wipe again and the group end up kicking the tank..

No matter what you do people will be idiots, I try my best as a healer to keep people alive and to not run out of mana, but if people don't work as a team there's only so much I can do.

Comment by headhurt

on 2010-12-28T22:44:57-06:00

Before dungeon finder, I got to lvl 80 barely hitting any dungeons. I was in a small guild, and when the time came around to run them, the "leets" of the guild always got first crack, everyone else was left to either join pugs that were spammed in trade, or not at all. After the introduction of dungeon-finder, those lesser geared were able to run dungeons out the kazoo, and gain ground quickly for better stuff. Those "leets" became butthurt because they suddenly weren't so "leet" anymore.

The dungeon-finder is a great thing for those in smaller guilds who wouldn't ordinarily get to run them, which was my case. I was able to quickly level up a couple alts using it as well. Most of my experiences have been positive, a few pretty heinous, but not enough to totally turn me off using it altogether. I like a previous poster's suggestion of using a tool that matches skill level for dungeons. You get one leet player in your group that sneers at the newly minted 80/85 for the entire instance, it makes for a long dungeon. I'm not opposed to some sort of tool that would ban jerks from using LFD for a few days to let them cool their jets and maybe not be such a &*!@#$.

Comment by Dorghen

on 2010-12-28T22:56:37-06:00

The game is 3 weeks old and people are wondering why heroics are hard... Give it some time! There is tons of people who just got their 329 iLvl and who don't know the H bosses strats.

I've just been in a pug where the tank was blaming everybody for mistakes he had done (in Vortex with the Adept's), but after a good 10 minutes of him refusing to leave or admit any mistake (and yelling I am the tank, so we'll use my strategy and stuff), we agreed upon one strat, got through and finished the instance and when that final boss went down it felt great, because I was sure we'd all be quitting before.

So what made it work? Patience, communication and the non-abusive use of CAPS. Seriously, I hate caps... I read loudly in my head and it makes me feel angry >=(.

Comment by executorvgk

on 2010-12-28T22:59:56-06:00

meh in concept it works but personally I miss the days before it, before it was all done inside your server and you would make friends and would gain some rep within your server if you were a huge ninja looter your server would know it.

Now you go in do the dungeon and you'll probably never see those people again theres no reputation you could be with a huge ninja looter and you wouldn't know it, I personally found that having a server rep kept people in line to a decent extent now even if it says the persons name and everything there's a sense of anonymity, sure you can kick the person but they already ninja'd X item.

It also gets rid of comradeship, I made some of my best friends in WoW via running dungeons with people in my server who were at the time strangers.

It does however make getting into an instance a lot easier and faster.

If a person failed or had a bad rep I simply wouldn't run with them, now I don't know or have the vaguest idea if their good or not and the kick system sounds like it makes people complete asshats from what I've heard, I quit before cata so I may be off on this.

I just see it as a trade off , we traded the quality of the people we instanced with for faster queues and being able to do more dungeons a day

Comment by Lutti

on 2010-12-28T23:06:05-06:00

The way I see it, I think a system where people get punished can be both good and bad.... It would definitely clean out a lot of the, ehm, not-so-nice people out there BUT some would get caught in it, who doesn't belong there... I probably would for example - I stopped counting the amount of times I've been kicked for God knows what reason.. Either I tried giving advice to someone so they could improve their gameplay (tried both nice and harsh ways, and neither usually works), or I've given my version of boss tacs.... Any such things... So I mean I would be pretty pissed off if I had to get punished for trying to help the group o_o

Comment by rodalpho

on 2010-12-28T23:13:24-06:00

Not much you can do about people wanting to be jerks.

However, heroic dungeons' difficulty combined with tank threat nerfs and healer AE and mana nerfs have resulted in many less players queueing as tanks and healers. There are two ways to address this.

1) Nerf heroic difficulty.

or

2) Provide incentives to queue as a tank or healer when the wait is long for DPS.

I commonly wait over FIFTY MINUTES for a LFD dungeon as DPS. This is getting out of hand. Something has to be done. We're getting close to a sitting at the lower guk zoneline waiting for a frenzy group kind of timeline here.

Comment by spongemike

on 2010-12-28T23:20:55-06:00

I have my share of terrible pugs >< today a port pally lvl 80 did blackrock while I was healing/ He had 39k hp O_o anyways didn't know a thing about the run itself but will not listen nor want to learn it. Just want pull after pull pretty much leads to wipe and everyone went on their way.

Comment by ciado

on 2010-12-28T23:37:28-06:00

I love being a Holy Priest. It's like being the goalie (which is one of my RL fun-things-to-do).

I'm not a ^&*!@#, I don't play lawltard games. If I come into an instance that I don't know/haven't been in, it's the first thing that I say after "Hiya guys!".I have been playing a priest since closed beta and I'm comfortable with the mechanics. I understand the algorithms. I read, I talk to other priests.

There's no way for me to let a group of strangers from other servers know that even if I don't know the fights, I DO know how to play my class.

1- I can't heal if I have no mana. New mechanics mean that even if I'm using low-mana heals and popping cooldowns, I'm still going to burn mana for when CC escapes or that pat comes through.

2- I can't heal you if you're standing in the sh*t. I can't heal you if you're out of range (ie: everyone needs to be in the triangle and you're tanking off over in a corner).

I hate being booted out (with no reason given, after absolute silence from the entire group) after a wipe where everyone was running around like chickens with their heads cut off or someone wasn't CCing or the tank stood in the fire.

I don't have an answer for what Bliz can do to help alleviate these issues. I don't believe that a rating system would work, because the trolls and a**holes will just rate like trolls and a**holes. Letting people into PUGs based on their equipment won't stop them from being a**holes.

There's just no way to prove that I know how to play my class, play my part on the team- to a group of strangers who aren't going to give a sh*t once the instance is done. Achievements.. sure- a bit. But do you take the time to check 4 other people's long lists of Achievs? What if the person knows his/her class/style/game.. but doesn't do Achievs or is a big solo player? What if the person just got carried by his/her friends?

Like being able to guild hop or to change your character's name/server just about whenever, a**holes in PUGs have no accountability.

Blizzard can't even get rid of the gold-sellers and bots, I doubt that there's a way to push people to 'play nice' in randomly-generated groups.

TL;DR version: I do my best and I try to talk to people, but I figure that the most effective thing I can do is what I do- if the run was good/great/not bad I thank everyone at the end and I let them know how much I appreciate how non-$%^&*!ly they were.

Also, I'd LOVE LOVE LOVE for my /ignore list to be longer, as well as for it to block or warn me of joining groups containing people that are on it.

Comment by jwsdsnake

on 2010-12-28T23:47:05-06:00

One thing that would help is if you make sure those of you queing as leaders know and explain the mechanics. I remember LK raids, and early heroics, explaining mechanics before each boss, or at least asking if everyone knew the mechanics beforehand, and explaining them when someone didn't. Groups would work out much better if people didn't just communicate to yell angrily, but to inform each other about mechanics and give class tips when neccessary.

As for rating other players, a system where only positive ratings could be given may work better than a +/- system, maybe limited to when all members are from different realms, or just so that players in the same guild or on each other's friends list cannot give each other ratings.

Also, even though its my fault, I'd really like if the que stopped going off every time I go to use the bathroom.

Comment by LordAnthrax74

on 2010-12-28T23:54:18-06:00

It's another good example of the G.I.F.T. if you ask me. Thank goodness I have no reason to subject myself to the seething morass of idiocy that infests such a tool. :D

Comment by danoedel

on 2010-12-29T00:05:47-06:00

Not much you can do about people wanting to be jerks.

However, heroic dungeons' difficulty combined with tank threat nerfs and healer AE and mana nerfs have resulted in many less players queueing as tanks and healers. There are two ways to address this.

1) Nerf heroic difficulty.

or

2) Provide incentives to queue as a tank or healer when the wait is long for DPS.

I commonly wait over FIFTY MINUTES for a LFD dungeon as DPS. This is getting out of hand. Something has to be done. We're getting close to a sitting at the lower guk zoneline waiting for a frenzy group kind of timeline here.

... i agree about the incentive, but asking extra gold is too much to ask because then people queing fore deadmines, etc. would get way too much money ruining the game for them... while a level 84(me)who wants to lazily hit 85 without major questing :) would wait hours to make the same basic money as the level 85 guy...Plus... that would be unfair to tanks and healers because they have a short waiting que, therefore making a good chunk of them go dps, making wait times even LONGERNow this may sound weird to you because your not familiar with it... but look at the xbox live reputation system after you complete the dungoen, or when someone leaves all members leave feedback in the form of 1-5 stars.1 star if he was afk, swearing....5 stars if he was funny, helpful....1-2 star people are grouped together3-4 star people are grouped together5 star people are grouped by themselves(hopefully this is the biggest category)now if you are in the 5 star group... you get 50% extra XP, Rep, Points... whatever except GOLD... because word would spread on how to trick the system.if you are in 3-4 star group you get 25% extra ?

Also Blizzard should allow normal realm people to que with pvp realm people, and RPPVP can que with PVP

Im not sure if they have this or not...but you should not have Ragefire Chasm or the Stormwind Stockade available for the dungeon finder...Remember all the "fun" you had invading Stormwind or Orgimmar at level 18? :)

MNDM Mok-Nathal

Comment by NamelesS258

on 2010-12-29T00:25:23-06:00

I'm a healer. i've just entered the dungeon with the DF and the tank leaves... okay, no problem, requeue with the grp, we are waiting for a new tank. After 5-6 mins, the new tank is here and he says: "if someone will do worse DPS than me, i will leave." - okay, okay, just go on pls! than the fight begins... tank seems doing his job BUT with the first heal i get heal aggro. i say: "dear big mouth tank, do your job and dont care with tha DPS" than i leaved :)

Comment by Rathix

on 2010-12-29T00:32:28-06:00

I think they should remove the LFD tool for heroics. I know, drastic, but honestly once you're at the point of doing heroics, it'd be nice to be doing them with people from your server, possibly expanding your guild and preparing to raid with familiar people. Seeing as a lot of drama comes from PuG Heroics, and that the pool of players able to run heroics only ever increases, I'd say it's reasonable and practical, I mean hell, we played without the LFD before, I'm sure we could handle finding server-only heroic groups. And I know, the option does already exist to not use the LFD tool and find a group on your server, but honestly, people have the option to either sit in town and look for a group for a while, or go out and quest/work on professions/do whatever while being in queue, It's fairly obvious what the the majority is going to choose.

At the same time, they could keep the lower level LFD tool available, because it really has been a boon to leveling and without it finding those low level SFK groups is an absolute nightmare.

Comment by Sinast

on 2010-12-29T00:36:36-06:00

Just today I had a 85 Ret Paladin in normal Stonecore ( I queued up with a friend who was a 83 Bear tank ) doing 2.3 - 2.7k dps. We get to the first boss and I said " Look dude, I know Ret isn't doing so hot right now, but 2.5k dps? Come the **** on man "

The 83 Bear Tank was doing over 3k, the 2nd place dps, an 84 Warlock was doing 5900 and myself, being far overgeared for the instance was doing 12k and trying my best not to go full on gung-ho and pull off my friend. ( I'm an Unholy DK so I wasn't spamming Howling Blast ) The rest of the group agrees to remove said Paladin if he doesn't step it up on the boss. At no point did the Pally attempt to give any explanation on his terrible dps, ask for advice, apologize, etc.

We down the boss, Paladin does 3900 and is promptly booted.

Was it the right thing to do? Who knows. It may have been a handicapped player, or a very young player who doesn't understand how to play the game properly.

I run my dungeons like a large company. I'll give you a quick low down on bosses and such, but if you can't even perform at the minimum required level, I'll find a replacement. Dps that low would be wasting my time. Dps on the low side is excusable, but theres a place where you have to draw the line. My personal opinion? ( Gear differences and exceptional encounters aside ) If you're not doing much more dps than the tank, you're being carried and as such, you are not entitled nor do you deserve to be placed in a group with people who have done their homework. Why should Eric get an A on his group project when all he did was come into class, write his name on the project and watch his group members actually complete it?

Players who generally want to get better will do some research on their class and learn what needs to be learned. Players who do no research and perform bad are ones that are not worth keeping around because they have no real desire to play the game.

Comment by Mortisse

on 2010-12-29T00:51:04-06:00

I think the dungeon finder is awesome, but lately it's been forever waits for queues which i don't mind because i can do other things in the meantime, but having people kick me out of the dungeon cause they want their friends in is a bit of a piss off, i worked hard to do heroics and i wait my turn in the queue so why should i be kicked cause they found a "better" person who doesn't want to wait? I think there should be consequences for stupid stuff, but I don't know how they would be able to make it effective :( and the deserter thing does make it hard to just leave groups you'd rather not be in because on top of the debuff you still have to wait for the queue all over again -_-

Comment by grandevil

on 2010-12-29T01:05:23-06:00

You forgot the "I'm intentionally going to make the healer's and tank's job harder" DPS who pull trash, don't CC and aoe on singel targets.

Comment by lockspwnbruh

on 2010-12-29T01:12:12-06:00

I never really noticed it, i have a lot of alts i do lots of random dungeons. But only in the lvl 85 heroics do i find the ignorant, commanding, rude trolls. I am actually able to enjoy the lower level dungeons with reasonable people. I don't know why that is or what can be done but it's just unfortunate what happens to the player base. I guess thats what guilds are for.